A research publication of the Hamovitch Center for Science in the Human Services at the USC School of Social Work

Hamovitch PI

2Longtime mental health director joins school, will help launch DSW

program and veterans clinic

Research reveals more teens are using alternatives to cigarettes like

hookah and electronic cigarettes 6 National experts gather at USC to discuss homelessness and its

effects on women 8

Bridge | continued on page 10

Practice and research are two sides of the same coin in the social work realm.

Clinicians rely on researchers to develop new and effective methods to work with clients, whereas researchers rely on practi-tioners to inform them of what works and doesn’t work in the field. Bridging the gap between the two, however, is not always easy.

That’s where adjunct lecturers and other clinical faculty members at the USC School of Social Work enter the picture.

Often full-time clinicians who engage in various forms of research and teach research-based theories and concepts in

their courses, these faculty members are creating a much-needed nexus between research and practice.“Even if my students want to focus on clin-

ical work and have no interest in research, I remind them that they still have to be accountable,” said Sara Schwartz, a senior lecturer with the school’s Virtual Academic Center (VAC). “I try to get them excited about how they can use research and evalu-ation to market themselves as clinicians, to make sure the work they are doing with clients is really working, ensuring the pro-grams they are supervising are still relevant.”

Adjunct and part-time lecturers at the USC School of

Social Work are serving as a vital link between research and practice.

Spring 2016

Bridging the research-to-practice gap

From the Director

2 3

As a new professor of practice at the USC School of Social Work, he hopes to continue that work.“Working here at USC gives me an

opportunity to feel like I can make a con-tribution to every piece of what I have been passionate about for my entire career,” he said. “It brings together so many different strands of my life experience.”

Southard traces his interest in helping others to the values instilled by his family, whose religious commitment had held his parents together despite the misgivings of their respective elders.

His mother met Southard’s father, an Army chemical engineer involved in the Manhattan Project to develop the nation’s first nuclear weapon, while working as a secretary for the military in Los Alamos, New Mexico. The two fell in love but nei-ther family approved.“My dad’s mother did not want her son

marrying a Mexican and my grandfather did not want his daughter mar-rying an Anglo,” Southard said. “The unifying factor was that both families were very Catholic.”

His religious upbringing led Southard toward the Catholic priesthood, a path he first considered taking in seventh grade during the Cuban missile crisis, a particularly ter-rifying period given his proximity to a strategic military base.“As I was focusing on

what I was going to do with my life, I thought I may as well focus on doing as much good as I can because it’s not going to last long,” he said.

Southard completed 10 years of training, eventually relocating to California to attend St. John’s Seminary in Camarillo. But as he approached his ordination, he felt he wasn’t quite ready to become a priest.

Instead, he took a leave of absence to pursue his master of social work

Mental health director brings talents to USC

The cover story of this issue is dedicated to the work of our school ’s adjunct and clinical professors who deliver social services and teach and train our students. To be efficient and useful and successfully implemented, evidence-based practices need to be translated to real-life situations. Health care practitioners, especially doctors, have a strong tradition of evidence translation. As evidence-based practice gains considerable momentum in the nation and internationally, social workers find themselves well positioned to take a leading role in translational science and practice. Social workers encounter clients directly, have a broad practice field, are involved in societal interaction on all levels, and are both cultural brokers and change agents. As such, our adjunct professors serve as a vital link between research and practice.

Homelessness plagues large cross-sections of our national population, including women (see page 8). As USC selects homelessness as a major problem that needs to be solved, our school ’s researchers and practitioners are taking the lead on this effort.

Finally, as an expression of the school ’s prominence in bridging research and practice and making its research applicable to clients and communities, we have hired Dr. Marv Southard, who recently retired as director of the Los Angeles County Department of Mental Health, as a professor of practice, an honor given to few people. Read about his background and new role at USC (right).

I hope you enjoy this exciting issue!

Haluk Soydan, PhDDirector of the Hamovitch Center

Vol. 6, Issue 1Spring 2016

DeanMarilyn Flynn

DirectorHaluk Soydan

EditorEric Lindberg

Hamovitch PI is a research newsletter published quarterly by the Hamovitch Center for Science in the Human Services at the USC School of Social Work. Send questions, comments, and reprint requests to elindber@usc.edu

Front Page Photo/Tracy + David Photography

In 2003, budget projections left the Los Angeles County Department of Mental Health approximately $21 million in the red. Would the burden of those cutbacks fall on staff members who worked directly for the county or contracted community agencies that provided equally valuable services?“In the past, there was

always a fight about what was going to be cut,” said Southard, who led the department as director from 1998 to late 2015.

To avoid an ugly battle, he worked with consul-tant John Ott to gather agency leaders, staff members, and clients and their family members to hash out a deal. Nothing would move forward until a unanimous agreement had been reached.“It was an excruciating process, but we

succeeded in getting through it,” he said.When the books eventually closed

months later, it turned out the department didn’t have a deficit. But the approach established a structure for community planning that helped Southard tackle some of the largest mental health issues in the county, including embracing the integra-tion of mental health and substance abuse treatment and enhancing mental health services for children.

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A little more than a decade ago, Marv Southard faced a

crisis that shaped his approach to leading the

largest public mental health treatment

system in the country.

degree at UC Berkeley, where he studied community organizing and social planning. The university operated on a block place-ment system, so after a year of courses he began searching for a paid internship.“My parents weren’t particularly pleased

with the change in my career path,” he said. “I needed to support myself, so the place-ment that worked out best was with the Kern County mental health department’s drug abuse division.”

At the end of his placement, a colleague encouraged him to apply for a job in the area with Catholic Social Services, which was launching a mobile substance abuse treatment program to serve five towns in the San Joaquin Valley.

Southard figured the experience of inter-viewing for a position would be valuable and was surprised when he received the job. He had little knowledge of substance abuse treatment and had to learn from the staff

members he supervised.“It set up a really good template for my

future management in terms of being someone who was willing to listen and build teamwork,” he said.

His focus on community organizing at UC Berkeley also paid off. The mobile program consisted of driving a large recre-ational vehicle outfitted with a counseling room to a park and waiting for clients.“If that was all we would have done, the

program would have shut down imme-diately, because who would have come to such a place?” Southard said.

Working with local church and city leaders, schools, and other community groups ended up generating the opposite problem: too many clients. The treatment team had to borrow space at schools and churches. In some communities, the pro-gram was essentially the only social service organization in operation.

Although the team focused on substance abuse and diversion work, people came with a wide variety of issues, including mental health and domestic violence problems. It proved instructive, Southard said, to realize that people did not come for help in discrete categories but rather as complex individuals.“If you are going to really make a differ-

ence, you have to deal with everything a person is facing and not just the thing you happen to be funded to do,” he said.

After several years managing the mobile program, he decided to further his knowl-edge, this time earning a doctorate in social work at UCLA. While looking for a summer job, Southard reached out to a high school friend working for El Centro Human Services in East Los Angeles and landed a gig as a forensic specialist.

The assignment became permanent after Southard finished his degree, and he spent the better half of a decade at the organiza-tion as vice president of mental health pro-grams and director of clinical services.“It was one of the main formative experi-

ences for me as an administrator,” he said.In addition to tackling the emerging issue

of HIV and AIDS and gaining knowledge of Latino specialty mental health, he began to recognize the importance of commu-nity support for people with mental illness, including assistance with employment to ensure individuals live rich lives rather than simply managing their symptoms.

“Working here at USC gives me an opportunity

to feel like I can make a contribution to every

piece of what I have been passionate about for my entire career. It

brings together so many different strands of my

life experience.”

Marv Southard

As a professor of practice

at the USC School of

Social Work, Marv

Southard plans to

continue tackling major

issues in mental health,

building on his decades

of experience as director

of the Los Angeles

County Department of

Mental Health.

Southard | continued on page 5

4 5

In her varied roles as an educator, clinician, field instructor, and trainer specializing in human behavior, she often finds herself deciphering complex ideas from the academic world for use in the field.“I love research, but the way it’s written can be hard to under-

stand sometimes,” Blair said. “One of the strengths I feel I have is being able to take that research and break it down. How can students use this knowledge in the real world?”

As an adjunct lecturer with the USC School of Social Work’s Virtual Academic Center, she strives to describe theories and scholarly journal articles in a way that is accessible to her students.

As a clinician and founder of the Sherry Blair Institute for Inspirational Change, she sees first-hand how advances in research lead to better care.

As a field instructor and continuing education trainer who works with social work interns and child pro-tective services workers, she under-stands the importance of relying on practices that are grounded in strong research evidence.“Research is so important,” she

said. “It helps us prove our point out here in the real world. Anybody can open up a textbook or read articles and regurgitate the information, but what do you think about it and how does it apply?”

Blair entered the social services arena later than some. Growing up in a working-class family in New Jersey, she didn’t receive much encourage-ment to go to college. The emphasis was on making money as soon as possible. At 24, she became pregnant. She ended up on welfare.“There were times I would feel ashamed about that,” Blair said.

“I definitely have some dysfunctional stuff in my past, no doubt. When I talk about it, I say I had to rewrite my story because it wasn’t heading toward an outcome I wanted.”

She decided to forge her own path to college, earning her way as a bartender and waitress through a bachelor’s degree in psy-chology and women’s studies from Rutgers University, then a master’s in social work with a focus on policy analysis and inter-national social welfare from Columbia University. She completed a second master’s in industrial and organizational psychology.“I was fascinated with trying to understand behavior, people’s

psychology and how to help them,” she said.

Sixteen years ago, she launched her own business, which offers a diverse array of services to increase positive and peaceful rela-tionships through counseling, coaching, consultation, training, and organizational development. The organization focuses on evidence-based practices, including positive psychology and cognitive and rational emotive behavioral interventions.

The institute is part of New Jersey’s Wraparound system of care, which provides individualized plans for children in need of support. In recent years, Blair has embraced an evidence-

informed intervention known as the Nurtured Heart Approach, which cuts across all services offered by the organization.

Blair’s background as a single mother has undoubtedly influenced her approach to clinical work, and she has found that sharing her story can help her clients open up about their problems.“When you have that insight, you

know what the struggle is for some people,” she said. “I know what it means to be down. I also know I worked very hard for everything and I know it’s not always easy.”

Blair also believes strongly in an oft-repeated Confucian maxim: Find something you love and you’ll never work a day in your life.“I feel like teaching keeps me green,”

she said. “That’s why I love having student interns, because they bring a fresh lens into the organization. It’s extremely rewarding.”

Although she tries to stay on top of the latest research, Blair said it can be helpful to read through student papers, which occasionally reference

a new concept or approach a problem from a different perspective.In addition to staying up to date on research by teaching, she

said her clinical work also informs her classroom philosophy.“Students really love when you give a real-world example of a

specific theory and how it helped you address a particular problem,” she said. “You can see when it makes total sense to them.”

As she reflected on the importance of connections among research, education, and practice, Blair said she would like to see a more concerted effort to bridge those gaps.“Researchers should realize they are not just writing for another

scholarly audience,” she said. “Students also need to understand if they are challenged by research, they need to dig a little deeper. I’m always looking things up and reading and learning.” t

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Adjunct lecturer finds power in knowledgeSherry Blair sees herself

as a translator of sorts.

A personal connection again drew Southard to a new position. He had reconnected with a colleague who worked on the mobile substance treat-ment team in Kern County, and when the two began dating, fell in love, and got married, he took a job as program chief in charge of county mental health programs.

After a year, the director of the depart-ment retired and Southard was promoted. He promptly set about attempting to integrate mental health and sub-stance abuse treatment, particularly after one client came to him for help. The man lamented that he had sought mental health treatment but had been turned away because he needed to be clean and sober for 30 days. When he attempted to enter a sub-stance abuse program, he was told he had to be stable on his mental health medication.

Believing the issue to be an easy fix, Southard had the substance abuse and mental health treatment divisions trade a few clinicians.“The immune systems of both orga-

nizations rallied to expel the out-siders, in one case even to the point of slashed tires,” he said. “The transplant was rejected.”

Careful planning would be needed to integrate the two systems, he realized, a lesson he carried into his subsequent role as director of the Los Angeles County Department of Mental Health. He had initially planned to interview for the job only as a favor to his predecessor, who wanted a solid candidate pool, but reconsidered when offered the position.“It was an opportunity to use my

talents, but also to have a bigger policy impact from a place like Los Angeles than I could in Kern County,” Southard said.

In addition to tackling the issue of integrated care, he continued efforts to embrace the recovery model, which focuses on client preference and

needs, and sought to expand children’s mental health services. Another major initiative involved working alongside Los Angeles police officers to provide mental health training and respond to crises involving individuals with mental health problems.

In his later years with the county, Southard began shaping the concept of health neighborhoods, in which a coalition of mental health, substance abuse, and primary care pro-viders would work with community stakeholders to address a particular social issue that affects health conditions in a certain area of Los Angeles, such as Watts or Boyle Heights.“That issue they work

on presumably gets better and the very fact

of working together creates the social capital that builds stronger connec-tions and improves other health out-comes,” he said.

In addition to attracting interest from health care providers and other institutions such as UCLA and RAND Corporation, Southard said he hopes to build on USC’s commu-nity engagement efforts to advance the health neighborhood approach.

In the immediate future, he will be leading the creation of a clinic for mil-itary veterans at USC and preparing to launch a doctor of social work pro-gram via the school’s virtual education platform later this year.

Southard’s longer-term plans also include potential research evalua-tions of health neighborhoods and Medicaid substance abuse ben-efits, which are being revamped in California. He is also interested in exploring the integration of faith and spirituality into mental health treat-ment, noting that Los Angeles was the first to develop clinical param-eters for such work.“I hope I can add value from some of

the policy and practice experiences I’ve had to move some of these initiatives forward with students and the brain trust that is this school,” he said. t

Southard | from page 3

In his new role as professor of practice, Marv Southard will

lead an effort to establish a clinic

for veterans at USC and oversee the

launch of a doctor of social work

program.It’s a question Ron Avi Astor plans to bring

to the forefront of his work as a newly elected member of the National Academy of Education, an elite organization focused on advancing high-quality education research and policy.“How can we take kids and families living in

adverse conditions and create environments that are so inspiring and supportive that their chances of succeeding are much higher?” said Astor, who is the Lenore Stein-Wood and William S. Wood Professor of School Behavioral Health at the USC School of Social Work and holds a joint appoint-ment at the USC Rossier School of Education.

Astor views education as a great equalizer that has the potential to build communities, erase socioeconomic disadvantages, and help children grow into productive members of society. To achieve that lofty goal, he said the education system needs to reflect on how to rebuild itself as a holistic supportive environment rather than just a conduit for academic subject matter.“School is not only a place where you learn material

to be functional in society, but it’s a place where you get support and learn how to interact with teachers and peers,” Astor said. “It could be the place that helps someone achieve a different vision of how to be a productive, caring person in the world.”

Although he lauded efforts to develop programs that address specific issues such as hate crimes, bul-lying, and poor attendance, he also wants schools to form an identity as a setting that tackles all of those problems at once through an overarching focus on socioemotional health and well-being.

He hopes his selection as a member of the

Astor joins elite academy

education | continued on page 7

How can schools provide an optimal setting

for both learning and growth that helps children

overcome adversity?

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6 7academy, which has approxi-mately 200 members world-wide, will give a stronger voice to that approach.“It’s not just an honorific

group,” he said. “They are very involved in policy and advocacy. It raises the credibility of the work we’ve done on bullying and school violence, military kids, and this idea of the school as an optimal environment.”

As one of few individuals in the academy with a joint appointment in social work and education, Astor said he hopes to bridge the gap between the two fields, which he views as having

grown apart in recent decades despite sharing common inter-ests such as addressing the achievement gap, effects of pov-erty on education, and dispari-ties in funding and resources for different ethnic groups.

Although social work has its roots in education, dating back to the efforts of Jane Addams and her famous Hull House settlement project to provide social and educational resources for working class residents of Chicago at the turn of the 20th century, Astor said the profes-sion needs to strengthen its ties with the education system.“There is no reason for a social

worker not to become a principal in a school or a superintendent,” he said. “From the educational side, there needs to be a similar emphasis on addressing societal issues like poverty, immigra-tion, and racism. These are not just side issues; they are central to what our national education system is struggling with and trying to overcome.“There are many opportunities

to influence school reform when we examine schools and com-munities using social ecological theory and research methods.”

Astor plans to share his vision for the U.S. education system during annual meetings of the

national academy, through its policy statements, and during briefings with government offi-cials and other groups.

The academy is also known for its mentoring work, and Astor, who benefited from a post-doctoral fellowship from the academy while teaching at the University of Michigan, said he is looking forward to interacting with junior faculty members and other promising researchers.“I’m excited and invigorated to

get engaged. I’m welcoming it with open arms. It’s a blessing because of the potential to reach more people with open ears and open hearts and open minds.” t

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Research shows more

teens are using tobacco

alternatives such as

electronic cigarettes

and hookah, a trend

that is concerning to

researchers who battled

for decades to prove the

dangers of cigarettes.

The use of electronic cigarettes, hookah, and other less-regulated forms of tobacco by adolescents has spiked in recent years, a trend bolstered by a new study published in the Journal of Adolescent Health.“You have a group of kids who might have

never touched cigarettes given our societal norms that we’ve managed to shift with lots of health education programming and intervention, but now they are using e-cig-arettes and hookah,” said Tamika Gilreath, an assistant professor at the USC School of Social Work and lead author of the study.“Are they going to transition to using

“Is inhaling e-cigarette vapor and hookah long term necessarily healthy?” Gilreath said. “I may be willing to concede that it is less harmful than cigarettes, but that doesn’t mean it is harmless. We really don’t know what it is doing to these adolescents, whose bodies are still developing.”

Gilreath is particularly concerned about the social acceptability of e-cig and hookah use, given the long battle to turn public opinion against cigarettes.“With tobacco, it took 50 years before we

finally agreed this kills people,” she said. “Now we are back at square one.”

Regulations regarding the sale and use of tobacco products like cigarettes and cigars are stringent, but newer alternatives like hookah are largely unregulated in many areas of the country. Some localities have placed restric-tions on the sale of e-cigarette liquids and other similar products, but Gilreath said the federal government has to meet a high stan-dard to show that a certain substance is harmful before developing new regulations.

New tobacco products gain popularity among teens

After a decades-long fight to highlight the dangers of cigarettes, researchers are growing increasingly concerned about a new slate of alternative products that is

becoming popular among teenagers.

>>

That lack of oversight has allowed a wide variation in nicotine levels and other potentially harmful ingredients in hookah tobacco and e-cigarette products. Gilreath cited research suggesting that one hookah session could be equivalent to smoking between one and 50 cigarettes. Although some nicotine-free versions of e-cig liquids are available, others contain amounts that would be fatal if swallowed.

The lack of regulation has also permitted companies to create flavored products that might be particularly attractive to teens, Gilreath said.“Hookah and e-cigarettes come in these

candy flavors—they can be very sweet,” she said, noting that the federal government stopped the tobacco industry from devel-oping cigarettes with other flavors.“Menthol was grandfathered in as the

only protected flavor,” she added. “But these new products are not covered by those regulations.”

Gilreath’s study found several unique groups of users, including one cluster of teens, mostly boys, that used many forms of tobacco and newer alternatives, including cigarettes, cigars, chewing tobacco, e-cig-arettes, and hookah. Another group only used hookah and e-cigarettes, but Gilreath expressed concern that they might eventu-ally transition to other tobacco products.

A separate study conducted by researchers at the Keck School of Medicine of USC and published in the Journal of the American Medical Association suggested that using e-cigarettes is associated with a propensity to

start using cigarettes or other harmful tobacco products. The survey of 2,530 14-year-olds at public high schools in Los Angeles revealed that teens who used e-cigs were more likely to transition to smokable tobacco, although the researchers cautioned that more studies are needed to determine causality.

Gilreath is also concerned about racial and ethnic disparities in the use of tobacco and newer products like e-cigarettes. Previous research has indicated that black adolescents are much less likely to smoke cigarettes than their white counterparts, but are disproportionately affected by tobacco use in later life, including higher rates of cancer, emphysema, and other chronic conditions.

Advertising for e-cigarettes and other products is highly prevalent in commu-nities of color, she said, describing a pre-ponderance of e-cig advertisements in and near her neighborhood of Leimert Park, a middle-class community in South Los Angeles with a large proportion of black residents. She plans to explore patterns of use among teens by race and ethnicity.“Is there a difference in this e-cig and

hookah phenomenon for kids who may be at disproportionate risk for health conse-quences?” she said.

Overall, Gilreath is hopeful that research and regulations will catch up with these new products, noting that the Food and Drug Administration and National Cancer Institute recently funded new centers for research on tobacco and related items. Her study was supported by one such center established at USC.“Let’s do this regulatory science so we

can start figuring out what policies we may need to implement to protect people,” she said. “If e-cigarettes are bad, we want to know it as quickly as possible. If they are OK, we need to know that, too.” t

“With tobacco, it took 50 years before we finally agreed this kills people. Now we are

back at square one.”

tamika gilreath

education | from page 5

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other products? Are they going to try ciga-rettes? Are they going to try cigars?”

The researchers examined data from more than 2,000 high school juniors and seniors in Southern California and found 10.7% were currently using hookah and 9.6% were using e-cigarettes. Current use of smokeless, dip, and chewing tobacco was much lower, at 2.2%.

These figures mirrored national findings by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which noted that e-cigarette use had tripled among high school students in one year, from 4.5% in 2013 to 13.4% in 2014.

8 9Trauma in particular is a critical topic

that needs more discussion, research, and resources, Wenzel said. She described how women experience more sexual assault, including rape, both before and after they become homeless relative to men.

Domestic violence may cause women to leave their partner and become homeless, she added. Perhaps experiences of violence years earlier contributed to mental health prob-lems and socioeconomic instability, plunging women into a downward spiral that is exac-erbated by new instances of trauma.“Many women who are homeless describe

ongoing, day-to-day gender-based or sexual harassment on the streets and how this wears them down,” Wenzel said.

Other issues specific to homeless women include difficulty finding employment, particularly if they are older than 50, and disparities in disease and disability due to increased longevity relative to men.

Although scholars described their aca-demic work on these and other topics during the gathering, Wenzel said they focused on making the event accessible to a diverse audience of policy makers, providers, and women who had experienced homelessness.“We shared our knowledge and insights

in a way that was valuable for all present,” she said. “Likewise, women who had life experiences of homelessness and providers also spoke. The level of enthusiasm was very high as well; there was enormous interest and commitment.”

One such service provider, Rev. Cristina Rathbone of the Cathedral Church of St. Paul in Boston, delivered the keynote speech during the two-day gathering. She described her work with chronically home-less men and women, including serving warm meals, developing a literary maga-zine, meditating, and praying together.“The real work we do, underneath all the

actual things we seem to be doing, is cre-ating a sense of belonging,” she said.

Rathbone repeated that concept of belongingness repeatedly throughout her remarks. She described how her oldest friend, who had been homeless in Los Angeles for many years, had recently obtained housing. During a meal together, she said her friend’s partner made a pro-found statement that illustrated the impor-tance of promoting a sense of belonging.“Not every house is a home and not every

home is a house,” she said, adding that sup-portive housing should be provided with

the goal of creating a home in which indi-viduals can become fully realized.

Service providers and policy makers should strive to create environments of mutuality, Rathbone continued, in which homeless individuals are celebrated for what they can offer, rather than what they lack.“Just because a person needs

help around housing or has a mental illness or a drug or alcohol problem or even all three, it doesn’t mean that he or she doesn’t also have a wealth of strength and skills and gifts and knowledge that the rest of us housed and more or less gainfully employed types often need, often desperately,” she said. “We all have areas of real and painful poverty and we all have strengths. It’s only by welcoming both that a real sense of belonging will emerge.”

Taking that message to political leaders and others in positions of influence who can direct resources toward issues spe-cific to women experiencing homeless-ness is critical, Mangano said. Local officials including Congresswoman Maxine Waters, District Attorney Jackie

Experts tackle homelessness among womenOne of every four

homeless individuals in the United States is a woman.

>>

But despite representing a fourth of the home-less population, these unaccompanied women are not receiving care tailored to their unique needs. Research funding and other resources are not being directed toward understanding how to address their specific risks and build on their strengths.

It’s a concerning trend that national experts on homelessness emphasized during a recent convening hosted by the USC School of Social Work to dis-cuss gaps in policy, practice, and research specific to women experiencing homelessness. The convening was sponsored by the American Round Table to Abolish Homelessness, Downtown Women’s Center, Aileen Getty Foundation, and Urban Initiatives.

“We do not know enough about this subpopula-tion and therefore what services are most appro-priate for women,” said Suzanne Wenzel, the Richard M. and Ann L. Thor Professor in Urban Social Development. “Because men are the majority of homeless persons, services are more oriented to men by default. This doesn’t mean that not all services work for women, but the issues of what’s appropriate, what’s missing, what works better or worse deserve more investigation.”

At the Second 1 in 4 National Convening on Unaccompanied Homeless Women, policy and research leaders gathered with practitioners and community experts to discuss new research and data, various health issues, housing approaches, and other topics related to women experiencing homelessness.

Following a tour of the Downtown Women’s Center, an organization focused solely on addressing the needs of homeless women in the Skid Row area of Los Angeles, attendees spent two days at USC reviewing strat-egies to promote better research and direct more resources to this vulnerable population.“It was an opportunity for pro-

viders of services to homeless women — and those interested in ending homelessness among women — to learn the latest research results and best practices, an opportunity for all-important networking and learning from each other, and a chance to accumulate information for policy advocacy,” Wenzel said.

Of particular importance, she said, is the need to shift from a generalized approach to addressing homelessness, or one geared primarily toward men,

to more a more strategic and tailored model that can address issues such as trauma, violence, and economic disadvantages that are more prevalent among women.

Philip Mangano, president and CEO of the American Round Table to Abolish Homelessness, likened it to efforts to solve prob-lems specific to homeless veterans, such as posttraumatic stress dis-order or traumatic brain injury.“There are very specific issues

and nuances to this population that are not just blan-keted over the general population,” he said.

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During a keynote speech at USC,

Rev. Christina Rathbone

emphasized the need to create

a sense of belonging for women

experiencing homelessness, an

approach she employs when

working with homeless people

seeking support at Cathedral

Church of St. Paul in Boston.

“We all have areas of real and painful poverty and

we all have strengths. It’s only by welcoming

both that a real sense of belonging will emerge.”

rev. christina rathbone

Philip Mangano, president and

CEO of the American Round

Table to Abolish Homelessness,

called on attendees to be

emphatic in their efforts to

attract attention to the issue

of unaccompanied women

experiencing homelessness.

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Lacey, and individuals representing Mayor Eric Garcetti and County Supervisor Mark Ridley-Thomas attended the tour of the Downtown Women’s Center.

Encouraging similar involvement at higher levels of government will be essential to making progress on topics like trauma-informed care for homeless women, Mangano said. He called on attendees to sound the alarm with policy makers in Sacramento and Washington, DC.“We are going to be a little

boisterous,” he said. “We might even disturb the peace a little bit. That’s our goal in these colloquys, to be the harbinger of a movement

that ensures all of those things for women who are outside the realm of policy and resources right now.”

The discussion has already led some scholars to reconsider existing research, including Ben Henwood, an assistant pro-fessor at the USC School of Social Work who specializes in the Housing First model, which provides supportive perma-nent housing as quickly as possible and

“We are going to be a little boisterous. We might even disturb the peace a little

bit. That’s our goal in these colloquys, to

be the harbinger of a movement.”

Philip Mangano

hoMeleSSneSS | continued on page 11

10 11

Bridge | from page 1

That sentiment is encouraging to people like Haluk Soydan, the out-going associate dean of research and new associate dean of faculty affairs at the USC School of Social Work. He views the link between research and practice as critical to ensuring that clients receive the best and most effective care.“The main job of clinical faculty

members is to translate cutting-edge research into the classroom,” he said.

“A similar thinking applies to part-time faculty members, who are often active social workers based in agencies and communities. To deliver the best possible programs and treatments to their clients, they need to follow and translate the latest research outcomes to address the needs of the field.”

Schwartz, who earned her PhD in social work from Portland State University and has taught research methods, evaluation, and research and practice courses through the VAC, acknowledged that it can be challenging to stay abreast of advances in research as a practitioner.

Clinicians often don’t have free access to resources like peer-reviewed journals, academic libraries,

and research training programs, she said. Many nonprofit organizations and other service providers don’t have conceptual models and evalua-tion plans to guide their work.“It’s surprising that some organiza-

tions are still collecting data using paper and pencil,” Schwartz said.

To emphasize the importance of staying up to date on research find-ings, she encourages her students to subscribe to journals and attend training sessions so they become familiar with translating research into their future clinical work.

Other VAC faculty members have found that teaching helps them stay in touch with the research world. Sherry Blair, an adjunct lecturer based in New Jersey, said reading

papers by students has exposed her to new topics in social work like intersectionality, a theory that posits that social identities and various forms of oppression and discrimina-tion are inextricably linked.“They are all doing research, which

helps me stay apprised of these new concepts,” she said. “I also like to go snooping around and see what is current. Teaching definitely makes me a better clinician and supervisor.”

Beyond encouraging their students to stay immersed in research as they complete their field placements and pursue clinical careers, many VAC lecturers use examples from their pro-fessional work to illustrate research-related topics in the classroom.

Lori Daniels, an adjunct lecturer who has taught classes on research and clinical work with military-affiliated families through the online platform, frequently relies on her experiences as a clinician and researcher to enhance her teaching.“We are out there in the world doing

things in vivo,” she said. “We are not just talking about it and thinking about it, we are actually involved in research and practice.”

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“All of my clinical practice informs my teaching. I try to bring as many real-life

examples into the classroom setting as I possibly can.

I think it really helps enlighten the discussion.”

clair evans Mellenthin

then delivers needed services to formerly homeless individuals.

Research has indicated that most people prefer a scatter-site approach in which units are provided to homeless individ-uals throughout a community rather than in one cluster. That may be truer for men, Henwood said, who might not fare well in a large group, but a congregate model might be preferable among women, who often cite a desire for safety and a sense of community.“At this point, we simply don’t know,” he

said. “It definitely changes the conversation. It highlights that there is not a one-size-fits-all approach. When you think of youth versus adults, women versus men, different housing solutions may make sense.”

Although he expressed some concern that focusing on certain segments of the

homeless population might end up pit-ting one vulnerable group against another, Henwood said he was encouraged by the convening and hopes it will lead to sim-ilar results as recent efforts to eliminate homelessness among veterans, which have proven successful in Utah.“There is a sense that if we can end vet-

erans homelessness, then why can’t we go down the line and end chronic and women and youth homelessness?” he said.

This was the second such gathering of experts centered on homelessness among women; a previous convening took place at Harvard University in 2014. Wenzel said maintaining momentum will be critical to sustaining the movement.“We have increasing numbers of

researchers, providers, and policy makers from different regions in the United States interested in advancing this issue,” she said.

The efforts of the 1 in 4 gatherings also tie in with the Grand Challenges Initiative, an effort led by the American Academy of Social Work and Social Welfare to address significant societal issues such as ensuring healthy development, eradicating social isolation, and ending homelessness.

Marilyn Flynn, dean of the USC School of Social Work, told attendees during her opening remarks that she has a special commitment, alongside scholars such as Wenzel and the university as a whole, to begin attacking the issue of homelessness as one of the profession’s great challenges of the coming decade.“I want you all to feel part of a very signif-

icant national movement that is designed to change society,” Flynn said. “I think we are poised and ready. Among the 12 grand challenges, I think we have the best science and the most potential.” t

hoMeleSSneSS | from page 9

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During an ongoing research project on new strategies to engage older veterans with posttraumatic stress disorder in therapy, Daniels said she has taken screenshots of her data analysis of depression scores to show her students how the process works.“I feel as if I’m walking the walk,

so I might as well show them what it looks like so they have a better understanding of the nuances of putting together a research project,” she said. “I’m able to generate more current examples and make it a richer experience for my students.”

Some part-time faculty members take it a step further, encouraging their students to get involved in research projects.

Clair Evans Mellenthin, an expert in play therapy for children and families, recently published an article with three students on school phobia among elementary school students. She credited her efforts to use case examples from her clinical work to enhance her VAC courses as one factor that inspired her students to pursue research.“I try to bring as many real-life

examples into the classroom setting as I possibly can,” she said. “I think it really helps enlighten the discussion.”

After she described in class how

she treated a 5-year-old who had a general fear of the school environ-ment, Evans Mellenthin said the students researched the topic and gave their own presentation on the case without any direction from her.

Impressed by their initiative, she worked with the trio to expand their work into an article that was accepted by an international journal.“As an adjunct, you have a great

opportunity to be creative,” she said. “What a cool thing for these students to be able to do. They are able to grad-uate and say they were published.”

Another benefit of having such a large faculty of adjunct and clinical lecturers is the diversity of experi-ences and knowledge. More than 200 individuals teach VAC courses each semester, for instance, and are spread across 49 states and 14 countries.

Schwartz, who is based in the Bay Area but has connections to Virginia and Washington, DC, said students benefit from the unique perspectives of faculty members from different economic, geo-graphic, and political backgrounds.“They are receiving a very robust

education from a diverse group of people,” she said. “Students get a better worldview of what social work practice and research can look like around the country.” t

“We are out there in the world doing things in vivo.

We are not just talking about it and thinking about it, we are actually involved in research and practice.”

lori daniels

Hamovitch Center | 1149 South Hill Street, Suite 360 | Los Angeles, CA 90015USC School of Social Work | Montgomery Ross Fisher Building | 669 West 34th Street | Los Angeles, CA 90089

213.821.3628 | hrc@usc.edu | usc.edu/socialwork/research

The American Psychological Association (APA) approved the appointment of Ron Avi Astor, the Lenore Stein-Wood and William S. Wood Professor of School Behavioral Health, as an APA fellow in educational psychology. This status is awarded only to APA members who have made unusual and outstanding contri-butions of the field of psychology. Astor is now a fellow in both the American Educational Research Association and the

American Psychological Association.

Suzanne Wenzel, the Richard M. and Ann L. Thor Professor in Urban Social Development, has been selected by the University of Southern California as its institutional representative in the Higher Education Resource Services Leadership Institute, considered one of the most prestigious and compelling leadership development opportunities in higher education. Applicants are expected to demonstrate a strong and sustained record of professional accom-plishments, movement into increasingly responsible positions in their schools and universities, and commitment to leveraging their training experience to benefit their universities.

Assistant Professor Erick Guerrero has received a three-year research award of $750,000 from the National Institute on Drug Abuse for the purpose of detecting, understanding, and reducing Latino health care disparities in the context of the Affordable Care Act. He has now success-fully sought and secured multiple federal grants in addition to receiving support from Los Angeles County.

Hortensia Amaro, Dean’s Professor of Social Work and Preventive Medicine and associate vice provost for commu-nity research initiatives, has received funding from the National Institute on Drug Abuse to explore neural mechanisms in women’s treatment and early recovery. Specifically, she will test the efficacy of a mindfulness-based intervention that she developed to increase retention and reduce relapse among women in substance use dis-order treatment.

Assistant Professor Tamika Gilreath has received a grant from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development to measure stress experienced by military-connected youths related to the deployment of their parents, relatives, or siblings. This research seeks to advance overall understanding of how to assist youths in military families who are attending public schools.

Professor of Practice Marv Southard has been selected as the 2016 recipient of the prestigious Robert Egnew Lifetime Achievement Award, to be presented in Washington, DC, by the National Association of Clinical and Behavioral Health

Directors at its annual legislative and policy conference. This rec-ognition is given to individuals who have made sustained and sig-nificant contributions to policy change at the county, state, and national levels.

The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation has awarded a $500,000 grant to Assistant Professor Emily Putnam-Hornstein to help her assess 7 million children born in California, identifying communities where clusters of children seem to be beating the odds compared to what might have been predicted. This work is expected to contribute to understanding of the protective role of communities in reducing adverse child experiences.

Associate Professor Dorian Traube has received pilot funding from the Coalition on Engagement and Well Being and the Annie E. Casey Foundation for a pilot project with the Parents as Teachers organization. She will test delivery of an evidence-based home visitation model using interactive, web-based telehealth technology, the first time a home visita-tion program has been delivered entirely via a distance technology platform. The goal is to expand services to hard-to-reach families in under-served communities.

Clinical Professor Ralph Fertig has received the prestigious Elizabeth Hurlock Beckman Award, which recognizes educators who have inspired their former students to create organizations that demonstrably benefit the community or establish a concept, procedure, or movement of comparable benefit to the community at large. Fertig was recognized for his work on the issue of home-lessness in Washington, DC.

The American Academy of Social Work and Social Welfare has selected Lawrence Palinkas, who holds the Frances L. and Albert G. Feldman Endowed Professorship in Social Policy and Health, as one of 13 new fellows across the nation. Election to the academy is among the highest recognitions that social work faculty mem-bers can receive. Palinkas joins Rino Patti, John Brekke, Kathleen Ell, and Iris Chi from the USC School of Social Work faculty as an academy fellow.

Michalle Mor Barak, Dean’s Professor of Social Work and Business, was invited to present the keynote address at the 25th Anniversary Gala of the Carroll School of Management’s Center for Work and Family at Boston College. At the conclusion of her presentation, she received an award for her contribution and dedication to the field of global diversity and work–life balance and in recognition of her long-term work with the center as a research fellow.

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